Striving for a flattering eulogy

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We’re Going to Have a Problem Here

Y’all act like you never seen corrupt science before
Jaws all on the floor like a class action just burst in the door
And started whooping Merck’s ass worse than a whore…
They just wanted a profit, throwing kids over furniture (Ah!)
It’s the return of the… “Ah, wait, no way, you’re kidding,
they didn’t just make Bryan Caplan autistic, did they?”
And Tyler Cowan said… nothing, you idiots!
Cowan’s a sperg too, he’s locked in his mother’s basement!
Ha-ha!

Well well, this is not going to hurt just a little, I’m afraid. Former head of the CDC and current President of Merck, Julie Gerberding, is accused of fraudulently suppressing data tying the MMR vaccine to autism. This may become a bit “problematic” for Julie–and Merck shareholders. Here’s the story.

There has been a shocking new development in the ongoing story of scientific fraud at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). A letter was released, purportedly by CDC whistleblower Dr. William Thompson, which shows that Dr. Julie Gerberding, former head of the CDC and current president of pharmaceutical giant Merck, was made aware of “problematic” findings in a study meant to investigate a potential link between the timing of the MMR (measles, mumps, rubella) vaccine in children and later onset of autism.

In the correspondence, dated February 2, 2004, Thompson refers to “statistical associations between the receipt of MMR vaccine and autism” and appeals to his boss to appropriately respond to a Congressman’s private allegations of impropriety within the agency’s National Immunization Program.

The date of the letter is significant in that, just one week later, Thompson was scheduled to present his findings at a public meeting on vaccine safety. When Gerberding learned of the disturbing findings, specifically that an on-time MMR vaccine is associated with a 336% higher risk of autism in African-American boys, the whistleblower claims an orchestrated suppression of data was performed.

Thompson revealed to Dr. Brian Hooker of Focus Autism that he and his co-authors on a 2004 study titled “Age at first measles-mumps-rubella vaccination in children with autism and school-matched control subjects: a population-based study in metropolitan Atlanta” deliberately excluded study participants based on arbitrary criteria, and this resulted in the disproportionate elimination of African-American subjects. By omitting this data, the researchers, including current CDC head Coleen Boyle and two other scientists still employed by the agency, were able to deny any correlation between the MMR vaccine and autism.

The fraudulent study has been used repeatedly over the past decade to support the CDC’s recommended vaccine schedule for children, and was even cited in over 340 other studies, many of which concluded there was no link between immunizations and autism rates.

Not surprisingly, angry parents have taken to social media to raise awareness of the whistleblower’s revelations. Using #CDCFraud, #CDCwhistleblower, #CDCPantsOnFire and other hashtags, they have alerted high profile activists like comedic actor Rob Schneider. He, in turn, released a letter written to California Governor Jerry Brown, asking him to respond to the allegations of scientific fraud and how this has impacted a generation of children.

Who the hell does this woman think she is, a climatologist? You can’t just go around omitting data and falsifying conclusions unless it’s for a very good cause. Like global warming climate change, for instance.

At any rate, I wonder who sells these MMR vaccines anyway? Oh my goodness. Well, this is going to be problematic indeed. And if any enterprising ESQs know what’s good for the wallet they’ll be making sure some furious parents find themselves well represented. I don’t know how this circumstance would legally compare, though the fen-phen settlement was enough to make any CFO swoon.

And just for a moment of sober reflection. All parents can likely recall some trepidation at the series of mandatory vaccinations. And the concern over their effect on the things in this life that matter most of all to most of us. To imagine having so much of that personality dimmed by a drug that was actually known to be a risk, yet administered anyway. Such a thing could cause a man to question his faith in the very fallen humans some are inclined to deify as science.

As a final caveat, any fair analysis is obliged to recognize the opportunity costs of eschewing this vaccine from fear of heightened autism risk. Were there alternatives to the MMR solution in question? And if there were not, what were the possibilities and impact of a child becoming autistic compared to contracting measles, mumps, or rubella from both an individual and public health perspective? Though obviously no statistics can be accurate when inputs are intentionally skewed.

So it would be gratifying to imagine a long incarceration granting ample time to make the calculations.

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6 thoughts on “We’re Going to Have a Problem Here”

In that quote there’s quite an unexpected series of juxtaposition: overwhelming white privilege/power, whatever, causes fuck up in black kids and . . . Rob Schneider. Somehow I conjure this memory. In India beggar mothers will mutilate the heads of their babies and hold them up for inspection at stop lights. Western tourists, suddenly horrified and finding an easy status mark, give them money which in turn encourages more mutilation. Then, the local police who run the beggars take (most of) the haul. Don’t blacks make a living being victims? I mean that’s the raison d’être of the whole show isn’t it? Could Schneider be slumming? Oh, the horror.

Another despicable facet of this failure to communicate is the liberal pantshitting it could have engendered. If the implications of the article are accurate then the vaccine is allegedly safe for white kids, but not safe for blacks. They should have stated that explicitly. And then…

But race isn’t real! Social construct! 99% alike! Discriminatory drugs! You just want black children to die of measles!

Alright then, we’ll vaccinate all children with it…

But that would harm minorities! Disparate impact! You don’t even care about autistic black children!